ERG members aim to stymie .50-calibre weapons ban to show strength before vote on Brexit deal

Hard Brexit Tories will use a Commons vote to try and overturn Home Office plans to ban high-powered military-grade rifles in a show of political defiance aimed at Theresa May.

Police want the .50 calibre or higher weapons – which can immobilise a vehicle or truck from a mile away – banned because they fear a terrorist who got hold of one would be impossible to defend against.

The endless vilification is encouraging a generation of young people to stereotype older people, with serious consequences

Hate crimes have more than doubled in the past five years, new figures showed earlier this week – no surprise there. But if you search the list for the motivating factor recorded in these crimes, there is one notable omission: age. According to the Crown Prosecution Service, there is no such thing as age-related hate crime. Facebook’s definition of hate speech is longer – you are not allowed to attack people because of their race, ethnicity, national origin, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, caste, sex, gender, gender identity or serious disease or disability. Age? Absent again.

So this week’s announcement that the Law Commission is examining whether age should be added to hate crime legislation is timely and welcome. It is evident that open expressions of hostility to older people have become more common since the EU referendum – the “old people screwing millennials” trope. Indeed, the idea that how you voted was determined chiefly by your age has been repeated so often that it has acquired the patina of truth. But it is based on a fundamental misreading of the data.

Rather than walking the country off a gangplank and into thin air, parliament should go back to the electorate

Enough! Let us put an end to this national humiliation. Around the world, Britain is increasingly viewed with pity or contempt. Brexit, were it to happen, would be the most consequential and gratuitous act of national self-harm in our recent history.

It is now crystal clear that there is no available deal with the rest of the European Union that can realise even a fraction of Brexit’s stated objectives. The only good way forward is for parliament to put the question back to the people, and for the people to decide that Britain should stay in the EU. To achieve that, everyone who possibly can needs to turn out in London tomorrow to march for a people’s vote.

Don’t know your EFTA from your EEA? Help is at hand with our comprehensive jargon buster

The entire body of European laws: all the treaties, regulations and directives passed by the EU’s institutions, plus all the rulings of the European court of justice (see below). Every member state has incorporated the acquis into their legal system.

In an interview with the House magazine, Johnny Mercer is scathing about PM and the Brexit process

A leading Conservative backbencher has laid bare the extent of Tory frustrations with Theresa May by openly admitting he would not vote for the party if he wasn’t an MP, and had no interest in becoming a minister in a government he called “a shitshow”.

Johnny Mercer, who has represented Plymouth Moor View since 2015, said in an interview that in the current political situation there was “absolutely no chance” he would try to enter parliament, and intimated that May was an unimaginative “technocrat”.

Theresa May’s admission in Brussels that the UK could stay tied to the EU for a year longer has prompted an angry backlash from Conservative backbenchers, who said the prime minister was “desperate” and “reneging on everything”.

Her failure to deny reports saying she had told the Irish that she accepted the backstop to avoid a hard border could not be time limited prompted yet more concern, with Tory MPs warning it raised questions over whether the UK would really leave.

Floundering for anything better to say, PM embraces solutions that both do and don’t exist

“You know what? I’ve had it up to here. I’m sick to death of going round in circles, trying to achieve the impossible. Brexit is a complete shit show. You know it, I know it, everyone knows it. There is just no way any of this ends well, either for the country or for me.

“So let’s stop pretending there’s any way of making everyone happy. It’s a car crash. Pure and simple. And if anyone thinks they can do better, then let them have a go. I’m done with being trolled by all and sundry. It was bad enough being humiliated on a daily basis by Boris Johnson, David Davis, Michel Barnier and Donald Tusk, but now even the Lithuanian prime minister is joining in. Enough’s enough. So that’s it. I’m out of here. Sayonara losers.”

The Cypriot carrier has gone the way of Primera Air and Monarch. What is going on in Europe’s aviation industry

Cobalt has become the latest European budget airline to go bust, following Danish carrier Primera Air, which ceased trading earlier this month. While the Cypriot airline had only two years of flying behind it, after stepping into the breach left by the failure of the national carrier Cyprus Airways, Primera had flown for 14 years. Both carried a fraction of the passengers of British holiday airline Monarch, which collapsed last year.

Of course it’s important we leave the EU in an orderly fashion, but the process must be time-limited

Back in 2016, 17.4 million people voted to leave the EU. And if today’s rumours about the government wanting to extend the 21-month transition period are true, we still won’t have left the EU way into 2021.

It’s vital we give effect to the referendum result. People voted to take back control of our borders, laws, money and trade. They wanted us to radically transform our country into a self-governing, free-trading nation and for us to build a stronger and more prosperous future outside the EU.